1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the treatment of aqueous fluids in the production of hydrocarbon and, more particularly, to a system and method for treating produced water from a hydrocarbon production operation.
2. Description of Related Art
With the production of crude oil and other hydrocarbons, there is normally an associated aqueous stream that results. This aqueous stream is typically contaminated with dissolved minerals and both dissolved and suspended hydrocarbon and water soluble treating chemicals. There is an increasing public interest in reducing the quantity of contaminants that are released to the environment by or during the disposal of this stream. Conventional methods for treating this aqueous stream to remove contaminants typically reduce the amount of suspended hydrocarbon and, in some cases, can achieve low levels of suspended hydrocarbon; however, such conventional methods typically do not provide significant or sufficient removal of dissolved contaminants. In fact, conventional technology and methods that have been developed over the last several decades typically reduce contaminant content by multiple sequential processing steps, such as by successive filtering operations. Although such methods can successively reduce contaminants, and although advancements in conventional techniques have generally resulted in increased contaminant reduction, aqueous streams treated in this manner still can contain contaminants. In some cases, the suspended hydrocarbon content in such aqueous streams is undesirably high. Further, conventional methods such as filtering may provide little or no reduction in the dissolved hydrocarbon or other contaminant content of the stream.
Thus, a need exists for an improvement in the methods and systems for removal of contaminants, especially hydrocarbons, from aqueous streams associated with the production of crude oil and other hydrocarbons. The methods and systems should be capable of providing a water stream in which the hydrocarbon content is less than a predetermined limit, typically little or no hydrocarbon content.